Under the Sea
by ardavenport
Summary: Another Jedi calls on Master Qui-Gon, a Jedi with a reputation, for help.


**UNDER THE SEA**

by ardavenport

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><p>Obi-Wan tilted his arms and shoulders to his right, guiding the droid-swimmer to the side to avoid the two Kalamni coming the other way through the narrow tunnel. Passing them, the nearly naked adult ignored the two offworlders, but the child stared with wide blue eyes at the two Jedi in breather face masks, flowing robes, clothes and boots. Ahead of him, his Master, Qui-Gon Jinn, went upward as soon as he emerged into the bright blue-green beyond the tunnel. Obi-Wan tightened his hold on a control grips on the swimmer to urge it faster and then upward in his Master's wake, the sound of water briefly loud in his ears with the sudden change in direction.<p>

They entered a large bright area of clear water, sunlight pouring down from the rippled surface above. On all sides, he saw a semi-regular pattern of thousands of round entryway holes in pale orange shell walls. Below them were the floating deep greens, purples and browns of a central garden. Kalmni younglings darted in and out of it with a few adults lazily drifting nearby.

Qui-Gon's swimmer zoomed to their destination, his dark brown robe swirling and billowing around his legs. Holding on to the control grips with his hands, his feet dangling free after him, Obi-Wan stayed right behind him. He did not know where they were going, only that Jedi Knight Gu'usshuss had commed his Master for help. Qui-Gon did not say what was needed; he said he did not know and did not ask, though it seemed clear to Obi-Wan that he had an idea about what Gu'usshuss needed. But his Master refused to speculate about it and admonished Obi-Wan not to.

Obi-Wan had objected to his Master keeping what he might know from him; he was nearly twenty years of age, an experienced Padawan. But Qui-Gon had only rebuked him about going into any situation with expectations that would prejudice his thoughts, tarnish his judgment.

Qui-Gon slowed his ascent and Obi-Wan felt the water pressure change in his ears. His Master finally stopped at an entry hole about ten levels below the topmost one only a few body-lengths below the water surface. Their droid-swimmers turned themselves vertical, their blue side and tail fins retracting into their pale silvery bodies, allowing their passengers to alight in the entry hole. It was spacious enough for both Jedi to float free in it and the droids parked themselves in a side alcove.

Qui-Gon reached for the triangular plate next to the door, but the pearly white barrier slid aside before he touched it. Jedi Knight Gu'usshuss floated just inside. He wore only minimal clothing over his smooth gray-green skin, beige tabbards covered his broad shoulders, crossed over and concealed his lower body, the long ends floating free. His lightsaber floated outward from the wide belt around his middle, a beige sash of fabric under that. The gill slits on his neck rippled when he saw both of them, but his large purple eyes remained expressionless. He moved to the side to let them in.

An artificial image of a rippling, sunny blue surface covered most of the ceiling inside casing irregular shades of shadow and reflected blue light in the room. The oxygen in their masks, extracted from the water for them by the breather units, tasted saltier, more stale in the confined space.

"Master Qui-Gon. I was expecting you to come alone." Gu'usshuss's low voice burbled in the water.

Qui-Gon folded his arms before him into the wide floating sleeves of his robe. "You asked for my assistance. My Padawan is as capable as I. In all things." The breather mask amplified his voice with a slight wavering distortion.

Obi-Wan's eyes went from Gu'usshuss to his Master.

The other Jedi lowered his unblinking eyes, yeilding.

"There is a child here who has Jedi potential," Qui-Gon stated. Gu'usshuss flinched.

"I will get her." He swam to a wide hole in the back of the room, his leg fins propelling him

Puzzled, Obi wondered why his Master had not told him that this was their mission. Taking a youngling to the Temple to be trained as a Jedi was a routine task. He had accompanied his Master on a few retrievals before.

Gu'usshuss returned, holding a strap loop. The other end was attached to a harness secured around the plump body of a bobbing youngling, limbs and fins swishing in the water.

"Goo-goo-goo-eeeeeeeeeeeeek!"

His large eyes full of worry, Gu'usshuss watched the youngling gurgle and happily squeal and swim up to Qui-Gon's face mask. He only frowned back and unaffected by his cold reception, she moved on Obi-Wan.

"Eeeeeeeeeeeeek-ooooh!"

Her mouth opened in a big, happy 'O', her fluttering gill slits and innocent purple eyes large on her face and neck. Her webbed fingers explored the smooth surface of her mask. She was very young, perhaps only a few days old.

Obi-Wan raised his hand. On the other missions retrieving younglings to be Jedi, he had immediately sensed a familiarity with them. But not this one. Behind her, Gu'usshuss watched her with great intensity, almost longing.

"Oooooggg-ooooohhh! Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!" She swam upward, straining her tether before giving up and excitedly swimming in other directions. Gu'usshuss pulled the strap in a little, keeping her away from the walls and ceiling.

Obi-Wan looked to his Master who watched the baby and then looked to Gu'usshuss with cold eyes. The other Jedi Knight only lowered his head in deference while Qui-Gon seemed to wait for something.

"Obi-Wan." He held his hand out. "The tester."

Hastily, he unhooked the silvery unit from his belt. Qui-Gon took the fat cylinder in one hand, flipped up the top and took out a long sample extractor. He handed the tester back to Obi-Wan.

"Give me the youngling, please."

Gu'usshuss pulled in the still squealing, bouncing girl and directed her toward Qui-Gon. She immediately fixated on him and swam right up to his face mask again.

"Oooooooggg-oooogg-gooo!" she burbled. He gently took one chubby arm, quickly pressed and clicked the extractor to it.

Immediately, she went silent, her large eyes stared at the extractor as Qui-Gon handed it to Obi-Wan who snapped it into its slot on the tester and initiated the analysis sequence.

"EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEKKKKKKK!" The youngling opened her mouth, big and wide in a delayed reaction to the sting of the extractor. Gu'usshuss pulled her back. Cradling her in one arm, he rubbed the sore spot on her arm and cooed to sooth her upset. She stopped crying and hiccuped.

Watching the small screen in the open lid of the unit, Obi-Wan saw the glowing numbers and lines cycle through the test. It beeped softly when done. He frowned, but the result was hardly surprising to him. He held it up for the other two to see.

Qui-Gon folded his arms into the floating sleeves of his robe again.

"This youngling has no Jedi potential whatsoever," he stated what Obi-Wan knew that his Master had already sensed. They both looked toward Gu'usshuss who did not speak while he comforted the baby. Soon enough, she was happy again, though she avoided swimming in Qui-Gon's direction.

"This child is yours." Qui-Gon's eyes remained unwaveringly on Gu'usshuss until he finally spoke.

"Yes." He nodded. "I was here on a mission last year. This child's mother was an informant for me, a very valuable one. But I was . . . . careless with my seed with her. And she used it to birth this youngling."

Floating before them, he folded his arms before him, but with his arm fins flattened against his forearms, he looked like he was cold. The baby fluttered at his side.

"Gooo-goo-goo-goo-eeeeeeeeeeeeee!"

Gills slits opened wide, Gu'usshuss lifted his eyes and met Qui-Gon's critical stare.

"She sent a messge to the Temple when I was off-world, and I received it when I returned. I came here immediately. She had hoped that her daughter would be a Jedi whom she would have some influence over."

Obi-Wan shut down the midichloine tester and reattached its strap to his belt. While strength in the Force had been known to be inherited, the trait usually dropped out of a lineage as inexplicably as it appeared and it most often only showed up in single individuals in a family. In the ancient Jedi past, any attempts to breed more Jedi or Jedi with stronger Force abilities had failed miserably.

"She then tried to influence me. To support this youngling. I told her that was impossible. She said that if I did not agree to her demands that she would take this youngling to the Foundlings Caves when she returned."

"Where is the mother now?"

"She is at her place of work. It will be evening before she returns. She left her baby in my care to . . . . determine her fate."

Qui-Gon exhaled, the sound amplified by his breather mask, and looked about the room and its rippling light.

"Then our task here is done. After you contact the mother and return her youngling to her, we will be ready to leave, Knight Gu'usshuss." He turned his body toward the door, his long hair swirling around his head.

"Master Qui-Gon." Gu'usshuss did not move.

Freezing, Qui-Gon's arm went out to the wall to stop his motion. Slowly, he turned back.

"Master Qui-Gon." Gu'usshuss pulled the baby to him. She squealed and swam around his middle, winding the strap around him. "You have a reputation for defying the Jedi Council."

"I do." he acknowledged, his arms folded before him again. "I trust that you understand, Knight Gu'usshuss, that I do not have a reputation for violating the Jedi Code."

The other Jedi cringed, stung by the coldness in the Jedi Master's voice. The baby happily squirmed under one of the strips of fabric over his body.

"If she is left at the Foundling Caves, she . . . she is young enough . . . she would likely be adopted . . . . but nothing is certain. And she will be alone."

"She is alone now, if her mother means to give her up."

"Her mother . . . " Gu'usshuss gently untangled the baby from his clothes, but she still swam close to him, arms and legs vigorously churning the water, the tether shortened by being wrapped around her father. " . . . . will give her up. Unless . . . she finds another use for her."

Qui-Gon's stern expression softened finally, his dark blue eyes on the youngling.

"Then I suppose you might take her to these Foundling Caves yourself. To save her the trouble."

"Goooooo-eeek! Ooooooooooogggg-gooo." The youngling reached for Gu'usshuss's lightsaber and he steered her away from it while completely untangling himself from her tether. He wrapped most of it around his arm and wrist giving her a very short leash, but she did not seem to notice as she vigorously churned the water with her arms and legs.

"Oooooooooggg-eeek!"

Watching her with sad eyes, Qui-Gon's expression hardened when he looked toward Gu'usshuss.

"Do you have a transport?" Qui-Gon asked.

"No, not a local one. My ship is docked at Mishshuseeti." He named the local spaceport where Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon had arrived.

"Then you will use one of ours. And then we will return to Coruscant. Then I believe that it would be best that you inform the Jedi Council yourself of this incident."

Gu'usshuss winced, but his gaze remained steady on the older Jedi. The implication was clear; if he did not report his actions to the Council, then Qui-Gon would.

They exited the cave apartment.

Gu'usshuss took Qui-Gon's droid-swimmer. He activated it and zoomed out into the open water to lead them. Obi-Wan clicked on the slave setting on the swimmer's nav-unit to follow while Qui-Gon hung on to the passenger handles on the underside.

"Master, do you know Knight Gu'usshuss very well?" Obi-Wan kept his eyes on their fellow Jedi, staying in his wake. His breather mask automatically amplified his voice loud enough to be heard over low hum of the swimmer and the blubbly whoosh sound of the water.

"Not really." Qui-Gon's answer came from below the droid swimmer. "I have mostly only interacted with him for aquatic training. And I did participate with Gu'usshuss in a few missions when he was still Padawan to Master Toomoosh. But that was some time ago."

Obi-Wan had also trained with Knight Gu'usshuss, but did not know him beyond that. Ahead, Gu'usshuss merged into a traffic stream below the brilliant, rippling blue surface. He must have kept his daughter on a tight leash next to his body. Obi-Wan did not see her.

"Why would he contact you for this, Master?"

"I have a reputation."

He glanced down, but the droid body was between him and Qui-Gon, who seemed disinterested in looking back at him as he spoke.

"Master, have you ever . . . . ?"

"No, Obi-Wan, I have not," Qui-Gon answered his unspoken query, his voice momentarily loud and harsh. "I have always taken precautions to prevent accidental offspring. As I know you have as well."

Obi-Wan stayed silent, not wanting to cause any further offense. Up ahead, Gu'usshuss kept a steady, straight course. Obi-Wan stayed close enough to prevent any other swimmers from getting between them.

He heard a loud exhale from below. "Fertility, and its potential for attachments, is merely discouraged by the Jedi Code, Obi-Wan. It is not forbidden."

Obi-Wan saw a floating blinking signal up ahead. His nav-unit connection to Gu'usshuss's swimmer blinked in unison with it. They slowed.

"I still do not understand why Knight Gu'usshuss sought your counsel." Obi-Wan tightened his hands on the control grips of the swimmer and dove after the other Jedi, down into darker blue water, sparsely dotted with city lights.

Qui-Gon did not answer immediately; his mask amplified each breath.

"I can only speculate about what help Knight Gu'usshuss intended to ask. And it is not our place to speculate."

"Yes, Master."

The swimmer's depth warning bleeped, a shimmering, transparent blue force field elongated and formed a shell around them as they trailed Gu'usshuss.

"However . . . ."

Obi-Wan listened.

"I sensed that he has an attachment to his youngling. And possibly he had one for the mother, though her treatment of him has likely cured him of that."

Gu'usshuss's descent leveled off into a line of light traffic down a dark trench. Their droid-swimmer's forward lights glowed on the back of his. Neither he nor his daughter needed any protection from the crushing water pressure. The Jedi's webbed feet floated freely over the swimmer.

"It would have been easy for him, if his daughter had any affinity for the Force."

"Why did he not see that she has no potential?" Obi-Wan wondered.

"His judgement was clouded," Qui-Gon's voice replied sadly, "by his attachment. He was hoping very much that he could keep her near.

"But he realized that he might be wrong, so he must have thought that since I have 'a reputation' that I might be an ally in a possible alternative plan."

The walls of the trench vanished behind them as they glided over a large open area, whtie city lights scattered over a vast bowl-shaped vista, all in shadowy, dark blues. Gu'usshuss dove again down toward a wide dark hole. A few other transports darted up and down it's sides. The water went from deep blue to indigo.

"What alternative would he have?" Obi-Wan stared at the swimmer ahead, plunging down into the black, watery abyss.

"He does not appear to have formed any specific plans. But he has accepted that he must lose this attachment now. Especially asfter I made it clear I would not assist him."

Gu'usshuss slowed. A bluish glow suddenly lit up the entrance to a tunnel in the side of the sheer wall. He turned into it and Obi-Wan followed.

They traveled a short distance to a lighted platform with other transports tethered to it. Gu'usshuss parked his swimmer next to them and threw a shimmering link line to a fixed ring on the platform and the end around it automatically. He left the swimmer. The youngling shot out from his body covering.

"Eeeeee-ahahahahah-eeeeeeeeee! Oooogggg-goo-goo-goo!" She swam madly around, excited by the new place.

Obi-Wan angled his swimmer vertically over the platform. Looking around the swimmer body, he saw his Master watching the two, lights gleaming off his face mask, hiding his expression.

Gu'usshuss pulled the tether to him and the gently guided the youngling to him. He lowered his head and she pressed her face to his, all smiles and happy squeals.

Three Kalmni swam up to greet him. Diaphanous white body coverings rippled in the water around them. They extended their arms to him and he turned the youngling to face them.

"Eeeee-aa-aa-aah-ggggooooooooo!" She kicked her legs vigorously, but Gu'usshuss kept her in place. The three Kalamni extended long graceful arms to her and swam backwards toward their dark tunnel. Gu'usshuss solemnly lowered his head her over his youngling and slowly he swam after them.

"Eeeeee-gooo-oooh-gooo-eeeeeee . . . eeee . . . ee!"

The last happy squeal faded in the distance, swallowed up in the tunnel.

"What will happen to Gu'usshuss, Master?" They floated on either side of the swimmer.

"He will mourn the loss of his attachment, though the Council will tell him not to. And they will allow him time for his mourning, though they will say nothing about it."

Obi-Wan looked toward his Master, whose face had turned toward him, his features obscured in the bluish-black shadows and by the glint off the clear-plas face mask.

"They are not heartless, Obi-Wan. Attachments happen. Any of us are vulnerable to them, at any time or place, often when we might least expect it. The best that any of us can do is to allow them to pass."

Nodding, Obi-Wan tried to imagine what attachments might catch him by surprise, but he could not think of any.

Soon, Gu'usshuss emerged from the tunnel, alone. His eyes went to them, silently waiting. He said nothing to them. He detached his swimmer from the dock, activated it and left. They followed him. Up out of the tunnel, up from the dark hole and toward the surface.

The depth indicator blinked yellow before going off and the external shield shimmered and faded as they joined the traffic lanes near the surface and headed back toward the spaceport. Obi-Wan wondered about the Kalamni Jedi and how he could become so attached to his youngling in such a short time. He asked Qui-Gon about it, but his Master only smiled enigmatically and told him that only experience could answer his question for him.

They veered off the main lane, zooming toward the spaceport entry with a cluster of other transports and swimmers. Gu'usshuss led them to the air terminals and the surface docks. Obi-Wan guided the swimmer to a parking ladder so Qui-Gon could climb up out of the water first. A metalic blue-green attendant droid accepted the ID cards for the two swimmers from Obi-Wan. Both Jedi loosened the straps of their breather masks, leaving them hanging around their necks, and inhaled the unconfined humid, salty air. Other people, mostly off-worlders, climbed up on the dock with their luggage, personal droids and colorful travel cages of tourist shopping acquisitions. Ships rumbled up into the sky from the huge floating platforms.

Knight Gu'usshuss approached as Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan brushed off the excess water from their brown robes and rapidly drying clothes. With a glance toward Obi-Wan (he was clearly still unhappy that anyone other than his Master had seen his youngling) he bowed to Qui-Gon.

"Thank-you for your assistance, Master Qui-Gon." He took a gurgling breath of air through his mouth, a trickle of water running down from his flattening gills. "I must beg another favor from you. If you could pay my docking fees, I would be most grateful."

Brushing back his long damp hair, Qui-Gon raised his brows. "You did not bring any resources yourself?"

"I did." Gu'usshuss took another, less gurgly breath. "But I used what I had for an inheritance. For my daughter." He lifted his head, stretching his neck. "It will significantly improve her chances of a favorable adoption." He pressed his thin lips together at Qui-Gon's frown. "The records of her origin cannot unsealed until she reaches her majority age. And only if she requests them."

Qui-Gon folded his arms before him into the sleeves of his robe and sighed. He turned his head minimally to the side. "Obi-Wan, please pay the docking fees for both our ships."

He nodded and went to the service droid at the terminal desk. He gave it his datarie chit and explained about paying the fees for both ships. While the droid processed the transaction, Obi-Wan saw his Master and Gu'usshuss conversing, strolling close together toward the surface skimmers to the dock platforms.

The droid finished and handed Obi-Wan the datarie chit back. He hurried to catch up, but before he arrived, Gu'usshuss bowed a final time to his Master and dove into the blue water.

"He is docked in a sub-surface bay," Qui-Gon said by way of explanation. They boarded the skimmer to the private docking platforms with a family of Quertas, three parents, four children, a lot of baggage and a crate of yipping pets. The Jedi were let off first.

"Master, won't the Council be displeased with Knight Gu'usshuss for misusing the Temple's resources for his daughter?"

Qui-Gon nodded and they paused outside their ship. The sky was perfectly blue and there was no land at all on the calm horizon in all directions.

"They will. They will sternly express their displeasure about his abuse of privileges and question his trustworthiness. They will only assign him minor tasks until they feel he has earned their confidence, again.

"How do you know that, Master?"

Qui-Gon shrugged with a small, sly smile. "That is what they did to me the last time I did something like that."

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><p><strong>ooo*ooo*ooo*ooo END ooo*ooo*ooo*ooo<strong>

**Disclaimer: **This story first posted on tf.n on 22-June-2011. All characters and the Star Wars universe belong to George and Lucasfilm; I am just playing in their sandbox.


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